# The Newsroom is coming back (for more punishment?) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 10, 2013, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171 "2013-07-10T20:13:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/201 "2013-08-28T18:18:15Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > That whole idea is pretty sloppy. If there were several institutional failures, and Jerry Dantana also faked the interview video and lied about it, why is he suddenly off the hook from getting fired for something so egregious? I don’t think Dantana gets off the hook, nor do I think Jerry expects to get his job back. He’s just not happy with the idea that he’s the only one who lost his job and is effectively suing out of spite and wants one/all of Mack, Sam, and Will to be fired. I think Sam really should step down. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/202 "2013-08-28T18:54:54Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > Maggie’s “Africa story” confuses me also. She said she wanted to be the African authority in the office but it seemed like she was only there to cover a fluff piece about soldiers building an orphanage. No Koni coverage, no Egypt coverage, no Libya coverage. > > The Genoa story on the other hand is massive - one of the biggest news stories in US history, if it was true. Come to think of it, if it was just white phosphorus, there would be many survivors? Tests to see if serin was used? So many examples of “institutional failure” to be found. I might be siding with Dantana on this one… I think the idea was that they were going to serve an extended stay in Africa and that the orphanage story was just a little palate cleanser to get the ball rolling. That all changed when the shooting happened and ACN immediately cancelled the plan and pulled them out. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/203 "2013-08-28T19:03:13Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > I don’t think Dantana gets off the hook, nor do I think Jerry expects to get his job back. He’s just not happy with the idea that he’s the only one who lost his job and is effectively suing out of spite and wants one/all of Mack, Sam, and Will to be fired. > > I think Sam really should step down. Wait, who is Sam? ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/204 "2013-08-28T19:24:04Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > I think the idea was that they were going to serve an extended stay in Africa and that the orphanage story was just a little palate cleanser to get the ball rolling. That all changed when the shooting happened and ACN immediately cancelled the plan and pulled them out. I think that she wanted to embed with the Army. They agreed but only if she visited the Army doing good first and produced a puff piece. ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/205 "2013-08-28T20:49:43Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Wait, who is Sam? Sorry. The actor’s name is Sam. Charlie, the old guy. ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/206 "2013-08-28T21:37:19Z")
I keep wanting to call him Jack. heh. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/207 "2013-08-28T22:14:17Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > I don’t think Dantana gets off the hook, nor do I think Jerry expects to get his job back. He’s just not happy with the idea that he’s the only one who lost his job and is effectively suing out of spite and wants one/all of Mack, Sam, and Will to be fired. Unless there’s an aspect of labor law that I’m totally unaware of, that seems ridiculous. If a car company sells a car that has a tendency to explode when rearended, and one particular employee knowing and consciously fabricated test data which hid the defect, while 20 or 30 other employees were a bit lax in double checking things but didn’t do anything deliberately wrong, I don’t know of any legal or ethical principle which makes it wrong for the company to fire the first guy but not the others. ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/208 "2013-08-28T22:29:30Z")
His coworkers are safe but the supervisor might be in the hotseat. Especially since that supervisor never actually supervised any testing first hand and was acting mostly/entirely on hear-say. And given the magnitude of the story, I’d say they’re not just making cars. Let’s say… schoolbuses. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2013, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/209 "2013-08-28T23:11:08Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > Unless there’s an aspect of labor law that I’m totally unaware of, that seems ridiculous. If a car company sells a car that has a tendency to explode when rearended, and one particular employee knowing and consciously fabricated test data which hid the defect, while 20 or 30 other employees were a bit lax in double checking things but didn’t do anything deliberately wrong, I don’t know of any legal or ethical principle which makes it wrong for the company to fire the first guy but not the others. Sure. He’s suing and he probably won’t win if it got all the way through trial. On the other hand, he’s probably hoping that he’ll get a nuisance payment out of the deal figuring that the station will cave in order to not have more bad publicity. ---
**Author:** ![randwill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a3d4f5/32.png) [@randwill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/randwill)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2013, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/210 "2013-08-29T18:58:14Z")
Best episode of the season marred by the final scene. I was watching closely while Mac watched the “unedited” tape of the interview, but I never saw the tell-tale shot clock snafu which tipped her to the deception. Like a lot of things on TV, “The Simpsons” did it first. [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSfrbqCQr78) ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2013, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/211 "2013-08-29T22:19:18Z")
> [@randwill](#): > > I was watching closely while Mac watched the “unedited” tape of the interview, but I never saw the tell-tale shot clock snafu which tipped her to the deception. Neither did I! I figured I just missed it – despite looking for it – and I couldn’t be bothered to rewind and watch it again. Glad it wasn’t just me. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/212 "2013-08-30T00:57:11Z")
They didn’t show it. I watched twice. For some odd reason, they had Will teach Mac about the shot clock earlier, they had her look at the timer and then go to the editing room and stare and the shot clock over and over with her big gaping mouth but I think when she cornered him in the elevator and said “You forgot about the shot clock” that was supposed to be the reveal. I think they think we really hadn’t figured it out yet. ---
**Author:** ![randwill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a3d4f5/32.png) [@randwill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/randwill)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/213 "2013-08-30T01:46:18Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > They didn’t show it. I watched twice. For some odd reason, they had Will teach Mac about the shot clock earlier, they had her look at the timer and then go to the editing room and stare and the shot clock over and over with her big gaping mouth but I think when she cornered him in the elevator and said “You forgot about the shot clock” that was supposed to be the reveal. I think they think we really hadn’t figured it out yet. Whereas a lot of us knew something was up from the moment the General demanded the game be on during the interview. Which was pretty contrived. Even during the play-offs there would be an hour with no televised basketball during which the interview could have been conducted. ---
**Author:** ![FlightlessBird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/cdc98d/32.png) [@FlightlessBird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlightlessBird)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/214 "2013-08-30T15:47:53Z")
If the shot clock is moving around, then the camera and basketball action would also be moving around. True that between 14 and 4 seconds the action would have been at the same end of the floor, but the people should have moved around. The clock isn’t some kind of unrelated thing, it’s defining TIME. “you forgot the shot clock … [and the players jumping around in frame.]” I figured if he was going to doctor the video he would have taken the portion of video to the left of his arm(his hand was partially under the screen) that is under ‘normal time’ and lay it over his edited version. I bet that would have worked ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/215 "2013-08-30T17:46:23Z")
> [@FlightlessBird](#): > > I figured if he was going to doctor the video he would have taken the portion of video to the left of his arm(his hand was partially under the screen) that is under ‘normal time’ and lay it over his edited version. > I bet that would have worked And, as I pointed out, that’s exactly what he appeared to be doing when he edited the video. [Here](http://www.lfexaminer.com/misc/Newsroom01.jpg) is a screencap (from episode 5, two weeks ago) of the quick, but perfectly clear, shot in which Dantana outlines the general in the foreground as if he were going to drop the edited video over an unedited background. I can’t for the life of me think why they would show us that if not to give the impression that he knew what the hell he was doing, and wasn’t dumb enough to leave a blatant clue to his tampering. [Here](http://www.lfexaminer.com/misc/Newsroom02.jpg) is the close-up shot, from the latest episode, in which Mac discovers the shot clock discrepancy. The clock is in the lower right part of the screen. [Here](http://www.lfexaminer.com/misc/Newsroom03.jpg) is the shot of the tampered “original” footage, supposedly showing the shot clock. The clock is fuzzy and we cannot see the numbers clearly, and we never see the actual jump cut that is supposed to be the reveal: we only see Mac’s reaction to it. They also toss in a quick shot of Will being deposed and saying, “He [Dantana] lucked out. He wouldn’t have been able to do it if there had been action in the frame.” But in the brief clips we see, there is action in the frame! IMHO, my first picture shows that Dantana was fully aware of the continuity problem and intended to substitute a different background. (Although if I had been him, I would have masked only the TV screen, and dropped in a continuous portion of the game.) But the series goes on as if that’s not what happened, and that somehow this experienced TV producer was not smart enough to recognize that his career-threatening tampering had caused a rather obvious continuity problem. Can anyone else, maybe someone with more experience in TV production or video editing, provide a different explanation for the first picture? One that would somehow make sense of what he’s doing, but on the assumption that he’s an idiot? This whole part of the storyline is so contrived and artificial that it makes me want to scream. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/216 "2013-08-30T18:08:22Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > And, as I pointed out, that’s exactly what he appeared to be doing when he edited the video. [Here](http://www.lfexaminer.com/misc/Newsroom01.jpg) is a screencap (from episode 5, two weeks ago) of the quick, but perfectly clear, shot in which Dantana outlines the general in the foreground as if he were going to drop the edited video over an unedited background. I can’t for the life of me think why they would show us that if not to give the impression that he knew what the hell he was doing, and wasn’t dumb enough to leave a blatant clue to his tampering. I was under the impression, at the time, that when he was doing that he was getting rid of the background to make it presentable for TV since he said he was just going to black/blur out the game. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/217 "2013-08-30T18:12:08Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > I was under the impression, at the time, that when he was doing that he was getting rid of the background to make it presentable for TV since he said he was just going to black/blur out the game. Me too. And later that the General was smart enough to have the TV in the background to protect himself. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/218 "2013-08-30T18:58:21Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > I was under the impression, at the time, that when he was doing that he was getting rid of the background to make it presentable for TV since he said he was just going to black/blur out the game. But he didn’t, as we can see in the third picture. > [@hajario](#): > > Me too. And later that the General was smart enough to have the TV in the background to protect himself. The general didn’t have anything to do with it. Maggie suggested a different framing, and Jerry said no. The general didn’t set this up, or even have a say. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/219 "2013-08-30T19:09:00Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > But he didn’t, as we can see in the third picture. That was the fake raw footage, meant for when someone wanted to go back and look at it. The actual raw footage would have included him saying “IF we had used chemical weapons” (or whatever the exact wording was). If Mac and Will and, well, anyone saw that, the whole interview would have been tossed. We were supposed to say “Wow, he’s so clever, he’s really covering all his tracks here”, and if it wasn’t for the shot clock (and the game in general) in theory, he would have gotten away with it. OTOH, Sloans nudie pics makes it pretty clear they’ll bring in video/picture experts for lesser offenses, so at some point someone would have found the edits. ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2013, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171/220 "2013-08-30T20:21:14Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > …This whole part of the storyline is so contrived and artificial that it makes me want to scream. Me, too. Coming up with a plot that plays fair through the twists and reversals and reveals that prime time demands, takes time. It takes time to consider various options and play them out to see if they are plausible and consistent in the universe of the story. It takes time to reject choices that don’t work and come up with new ones–which then need to be similarly tested for plausibility. Sorkin, quite simply, is _not_ putting in that time. He’s off on press junkets and parties and promotional events of all kinds…and otherwise doing stuff other than thinking about his plot. His choice to do all the writing himself is not working. He’s resorting to hand-waving and to a reliance on a liberal audience’s partisan support. He’s relying on people’s good will, instead of relying on good work. As a progressive, I’m aggravated that Sorkin is taking up the space (and funding and green-lighting) that a progressive writer of integrity and imagination could be occupying. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-newsroom-is-coming-back-for-more-punishment/663171.md?page=12)